AAU : The Glory Days

I believe that when an individual first gets involved with the game of basketball, they usually join some sort of an AAU team. AAU is one of the largest sports organizations that young athletes get involved with in order to better themselves and grow as an athlete. For me, I loved AAU season. I enjoyed the fact that I could build a bond with my teammates, travel to places, and play against a variety of different competition. I always played a year up in AAU because I wanted to better myself and be able to play against the best. I miss every part of AAU mostly because that is the time where you put on a show and play like you never played before. You get an opportunity to play in front of many D1, D2, and D3 coaches. It is basically like an interview if you want to be technical because you have to play up to your level and hope that one of the coaches are impressed by your level of play and effort.

I went to a tournament this pass weekend to watch a team play in Chantilly, VA. Going to this tournament and watching them play, made me realize that I would love to go back in time and have the chance to play again. It was amazing to see the a wide variety of teams from different cities and states come together and play against one another. The girls game is most definitely growing and making a change for the better. I saw some girls at very young ages already standing about 6'4" and others who had already developed some skills that you usually don't see athletes at that age doing. It was great to see the comradery of each team bonding and having each others backs. The athletes were all playing hard and playing each possession like it was their last. This was one of the better tournaments that I have been to see individuals play because each game was pretty close (meaning each team was about the same level) , there were no mishaps (like missing refs or game delays), and each team got to play a good amount of games.

AAU is something that all athletes that are aspiring to succeed in basketball, should become apart of. For some kids, they will admit that they enjoy playing AAU more than they do for there school program. The reason is because they have a better chance of getting recruited by more colleges rather than their school and have fun all at the same time.

(submitted by: Brittany Drew)